# Salman Rushdie’s second act: 'My interest now is to lead the life that is mine to lead'

Page: https://stenobird.com/podcast/firing-line-with-margaret-hoover-3927052/salman-rushdie-s-second-act-my-interest-now-is-to-lead-the-life-that-is-mine-to-lead
Text version: https://stenobird.com/podcast/firing-line-with-margaret-hoover-3927052/salman-rushdie-s-second-act-my-interest-now-is-to-lead-the-life-that-is-mine-to-lead.md
Podcast: [Firing Line with Margaret Hoover](https://stenobird.com/podcast/firing-line-with-margaret-hoover-3927052)
Published: 2026-09-05T00:00:00+00:00
Episode link: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/firing-line/episodes/Salman-Rushdies-second-act-My-interest-now-is-to-lead-the-life-that-is-mine-to-lead-e3obnca
Audio file: https://anchor.fm/s/59ca458c/podcast/play/125213514/https%3A%2F%2Fd3ctxlq1ktw2nl.cloudfront.net%2Fstaging%2F2026-8-4%2F5e5d8135-5d71-a61f-4b33-61a6a7568edd.mp3
Processing state: not_requested
JSON: https://stenobird.com/v1/public/podcasts/firing-line-with-margaret-hoover-3927052/episodes/salman-rushdie-s-second-act-my-interest-now-is-to-lead-the-life-that-is-mine-to-lead
Duration seconds: 2559

## Resource

Author Salman Rushdie reflects on the “second act” he nearly didn’t get: surviving the 2022 attempt on his life, reclaiming his life and returning to fiction. He discusses the new documentary "Knife: The Attempted Murder of Salman Rushdie," how the attack changed his writing and his relationship to mortality, and why his creative process has become more improvisational with age. Rushdie also reflects on Jorge Luis Borges, blindness and finding “another way of seeing”; Iran’s decades-old fatwa against him; Palestinian statehood; and the rise of Hindu nationalism in Narendra Modi’s India. Twenty-five years after 9/11, he considers the persistence of religious extremism, the fight for free speech in America and what he ultimately hopes will define his legacy: not the controversies or attacks, but the books he leaves behind. Support for Firing Line with Margaret Hoover is provided by Robert Granieri, Vanessa and Henry Cornell, The Margaret and Daniel Loeb Foundation, The Beth and Ravenel Curry Foundation, The Meadowlark Foundation, The Philip I Kent Foundation, Anne & Edward Lamont, and Jared Stone.

## Actions

- request_transcript: `POST https://stenobird.com/v1/public/podcasts/firing-line-with-margaret-hoover-3927052/episodes/salman-rushdie-s-second-act-my-interest-now-is-to-lead-the-life-that-is-mine-to-lead/transcription-requests` — Idempotently request low-priority transcript generation for this episode.
- read_markdown: `GET https://stenobird.com/podcast/firing-line-with-margaret-hoover-3927052/salman-rushdie-s-second-act-my-interest-now-is-to-lead-the-life-that-is-mine-to-lead.md` — Read the agent-friendly Markdown representation of this episode resource.

A page view does not enqueue transcription. Agents should invoke `request_transcript` explicitly when they need this episode processed.

## Transcript

Full transcripts are not published on public pages unless there is a clear rights basis.